#president duda english

[rightnewshindi]

रूस की पोलैंड पर हमले की आशंका के बीच जो बाइडेन से मिले राष्ट्रपति डूडा, जानें अमेरिका ने क्या कहा

रूस की पोलैंड पर हमले की आशंका के बीच जो बाइडेन से मिले राष्ट्रपति डूडा, जानें अमेरिका ने क्या कहा

Washington News: रुस-यूक्रेन युद्ध के बीच पोलैंड के राष्ट्रपति और प्रधानमंत्री के संयुक्त अमेरिका दौरे ने दुनिया का ध्यान आकर्षित किया है. पॉलिश राष्ट्रपति ने यहां यूरोप के भविष्य पर बड़ी चिंता जताई. उन्होंने कहा कि अगर पुतिन यूक्रेन जीत गए तो वो अपने युद्ध का दायरा बढ़ा सकते हैं. राष्ट्रपति आंद्रेज डूडा ने पोलैंड और अन्य देशों पर संभावित रुसी अक्रमण को लेकर चिंता जताई, जिस पर हिटलर के हमले ने…

[chodzacaparodia]

Every time Cheng Xiaoshi doesn't listen to Lu Guang and changes something in the past:

The inspiration was a Polish meme with President Andrzej Duda (under the cut), which I randomly remembered and I HAD TO make a Shiguang version

English translation: "Andrzej, what the fuck have you done?" "I don't know, I meant well…" "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." "Everything's fucked up. Throw the whole country away*"

(*It hurts me so much that there is no perfect equivalent of "do wyjebania" in English, because "throw away" does not contain the power of cuss word as in Polish 😭😭😭)

[theroyalweekly]

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William also met with Poland’s President, Andrzej Duda, to “express his thanks to the Polish people for their ongoing generosity and hospitality in these turbulent times”. He was accomanied by British ambassador Anna Clunes and his private secretary, Jean-Christophe Gray. -- Rebecca English

[mariacallous]

UNITED NATIONS—It’s no small feat to steal a show as big as the annual September gathering of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. Yet even in this rarefied sphere, many VIPs will be angling to catch up with one man. For a fleeting moment, dignitaries will be able to have a quiet word or a snap quick selfie with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky without having to take a 10-hour train ride through an active war zone.

For his part, Zelensky arrived in New York with a small entourage and a big agenda, hoping to garner multilateral support for Ukraine’s ambitious peace plan and perhaps even his government’s cherished goal of establishing a special tribunal to try Russian President Vladimir Putin for the crime of aggression.

“For the first time in modern history, we have a real chance to end the aggression on the terms of the nation which was attacked,” Zelensky said in his much-anticipated turn at the U.N. General Assembly’s famous rostrum today. Speaking in English, he told the assembly that “while Russia is pushing the world to the final war, Ukraine is doing everything to ensure that after Russian aggression, no one in the world will dare to attack any nation. Weaponization must be restrained. War crimes must be punished.”

With a Ukraine delegation including Zelensky’s wife and foreign minister joining him in the assembly hall, and Russia represented by its deputy ambassador to the U.N., Zelensky made it clear that he didn’t believe promises would be enough to reassure Ukraine. “Evil cannot be trusted,” he said. “Ask [dead mercenary boss Yevgeny] Prigozhin if one bets on Putin’s promises.”

Putin is already facing charges in the International Criminal Court for the alleged unlawful deportation of children from Ukraine. But an independent tribunal for the crime of aggression has been among Kyiv’s goals since the early days of the war, and its diplomats were circulating a draft resolution for the U.N. General Assembly’s consideration as early as last October. Ultimately, the proposal was left out of the resolution that was supported by 141 member states in February in order to persuade more countries to sign on. 

Polish President Andrzej Duda has been more explicit than many of Ukraine’s allies in his support for the idea. He told the U.N. General Assembly today, “we support the idea of establishing an ad hoc special tribunal.” Then, foreshadowing Zelensky, he added, “The crimes must be accounted for, and the perpetrators punished.”

But Zelensky may need to use all of his powers of persuasion to win over new converts to the idea in New York. “I’m not sure he’s going to find that the fence-sitters are very receptive to the idea of a tribunal,” said Richard Gowan, the U.N. director at the International Crisis Group. Zelensky might be arriving in New York with a stronger hand, Gowan said, if Ukraine’s slow-moving counteroffensive were further along. “It’s a lot harder to get other U.N. members to sign up to that sort of plan when they’re still very skeptical about how things are going to turn out on the battlefield.”

Moscow and Kyiv are locked in a diplomatic tussle for the hearts and minds of some traditionally nonaligned countries. For example, the foreign ministers of both countries recently made swings through African countries that have abstained in U.N. General Assembly votes about Russia’s war in Ukraine. Thomas G. Weiss, a CUNY Graduate Center political science professor and a longtime U.N. watcher, finds it baffling that more than 40 countries can still be sitting on the General Assembly sidelines. 

“In rhetorical terms, the one thing they can usually agree on is that colonization was not a great idea,” he said. “And yet they do not condemn this blatant return to empire.”

Some U.N. diplomats have been making the explicit connection between Russian aggression potentially leading to a revival of expansionist wars in other theaters. Linda Thomas Greenfield, the United States ambassador to the U.N., recently told FP Live, “If Ukraine loses this war and Russia gets away with what they’re doing in Ukraine, it’s a signal to others in the world that they can do exactly the same thing.”

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said that his emphasis this week would be on revitalizing the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goals, which are 17 goals intended to reduce global poverty and inequality by 2030. They were set in 2015 and are way behind schedule. The secretary-general said that a political declaration of support could yield a “quantum leap in the response to the dramatic failures that we have witnessed until now.” 

But he was pessimistic about the outlook for making any progress toward peace in Ukraine during the U.N.’s big week. “I would love to have a chance to be able to mediate peace talks,” he said. “But I think we are far from that being possible.”

The secretary-general expressed somewhat more hope of reviving the Black Sea Grain Initiative, the U.N.’s only relative success since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022—that is, until Moscow walked away from the deal this summer. Guterres will meet this week with delegations from Russia, Ukraine, and Turkey, the three countries involved in the now-collapsed deal to allow some grain shipments to ship safely from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports. But the mood here isn’t too hopeful, and Gowan doubted that the deal would be revived with the U.N. at its center. He thought there might be a better chance of a tacit arrangement, with Turkey facilitating shipments and “the Russians turning a blind eye to at least some Ukrainian grain exports.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Tuesday that Russian attacks on Ukrainian grain infrastructure had destroyed some 280,000 tons of cereals, enough to feed millions.

The real sparks may fly on Wednesday, when both Zelensky and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov are expected to speak to the U.N. Security Council. It’s been a little more than a year since Ukraine’s president challenged the council during a video appearance to either remove Russia so that it couldn’t veto decisions about its own aggression, or to “dissolve yourselves altogether.”

Wednesday’s session on Ukraine will feature plenty of speakers, but likely little real progress on the issues that matter most. “The geopolitical situation may be the most complicated since the founding of the U.N. Charter after the Second World War,” said a senior diplomat, who preferred not to give a name in order to speak freely, last week. “We are in a different era since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine, which is the worst breach of the charter since it was adopted.”

Zelensky may find it challenging to get the fence-sitters to pick a side, let alone convince Russia to forswear its aggressive war. His representatives at the U.N., though, have been doggedly trying to prepare the ground. Last week, at a screening of the documentary 20 Days in Mariupol, about Russia’s relentless siege of the Ukrainian port city last year, Ukraineian U.N. Ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya said, “I wish the entire Russian mission were here to watch this film.”

[thoughtlessarse]

Languages: Bulgarian

The former prime minister turned MEP Beata Szydło disagreed with her PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński’s approach to finding a candidate for next year’s presidential election, marking an unusual show of defiance towards the powerful politician. With Poland’s incumbent president, Andrzej Duda, the PiS (ECR) candidate for 2015 and 2020, due to end his second and final term next year, talk of who might be the country’s next president has begun, with PiS already showing signs of division over who might be the best candidate. “I believe that a woman is just as capable of running for president and has a chance of winning,” she told private radio station RMF FM on Wednesday – a clear reference to remarks made in late August by Kaczyński, who said only a man could be suitable for the role, although she did not mention him by name. Kaczyński, who rules his PiS party with a firm grip and will have a decisive say in the nomination for the 2025 elections, told the PiS-leaning Catholic broadcaster Radio Maryja in late August that the dream candidate would be a “young, tall and good-looking” man with a family who spoke at least two foreign languages and had a good command of English. In particular, the difficult security situation caused by the ongoing war in Ukraine – which would fall under the president’s remit as commander-in-chief of the armed forces – meant that, in his view, a candidate could not be a woman. “In wartime conditions, a woman would not have much of a chance,” he added, admitting that he was even finding it difficult to find a suitable female candidate. “I believe there are many individuals within our political camp who would be well-suited for the role,” he told the broadcaster in late August.

continue reading

[beardedmrbean]

WARSAW, Poland -- Russian comedians pretending to be the French president tricked the Polish president, Andrzej Duda, into giving them sensitive information after a missile exploded in eastern Poland last week.

Duda’s office confirmed on Tuesday that he was put through last week to a person claiming to be France’s President Emmanuel Macron.

Duda's office said it was one of many international calls that the president received at a tense time on Nov. 15, just after a missile hit in eastern Poland, close to the border with Ukraine, killing two men. NATO and Poland’s leaders have said the missile most likely came from a Ukrainian air defense system that fired in response to a barrage of Russian attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure.

The office said that appropriate services are checking how the pranksters could have reached Duda — for the second time. In 2020 they talked to him posing as U.N. secretary-general.

In the new recording posted on YouTube by Russian pranksters Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexei Stolyarov, known as Vovan and Lexus, Duda can be heard thanking a man whom he believes to be Macron for calling.

Speaking in English, Duda relays details of the missile incident, of his plans to request NATO consultations and of being very careful not to exacerbate the situation with Russia, which invaded neighboring Ukraine on Feb. 24.

Over more than seven minutes, Duda, sounding stressed, tells the caller that U.S. President Joe Biden does not blame Russia for the missile incident but that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy insists it was a Russian-launched projectile. He says he himself is being “extra careful” not to blame Russia but that Poland will seek security consultations with all of its NATO partners.

Opposition politicians lashed out at Duda, accusing him and his office of being overly lax with security.

Opposition Left party lawmaker Tomasz Trela said it's a “disgrace for the special services and for all those who should be checking who they allow to contact the top leader.”

“This is a blow for our security and for the opinion we have in the eyes of our allies,” Trela tweeted.

In July 2020, the same Russian pranksters posted a recording of a phone conversation with Duda, in which Kuznetsov posed as the United Nations secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, and rendered the president speechless with questions about Ukraine, Russia and his fresh re-election. Duda's office also confirmed that recording as authentic. Two officials from Poland's mission to the U.N. were dismissed over the incident.

The pranksters have previously embarrassed European politicians including Macron and then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, as well as Elton John and Prince Harry with similar hoax calls. ________________________

Took a min, but I found what I was looking for

The complaint said that Spanish-language radio station WXDJ didn't tell Castro in advance that he was going to be on the radio, as FCC rules require, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported Saturday.

DJs Joe Ferrero and Enrique Santos called the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Relations, identified themselves as Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez, and asked to speak to Castro. They managed to work their way through the system and got him on the air live. Only then did they tell Castro that it was a joke call from a Miami radio station, and the conversation ended after Castro denounced the callers with a stream of vulgarities. The entire process was broadcast.

Bureaucratic nonsense, lol

[definitelynotdamiano]

Post by cielesne on instagram, summarizing what is happening in Poland right now (06.11.2021)

You can donate to Aborcyjny Dream Team here:

https://zrzutka.pl/55g5gx (site in Polish)

https://zrzutka.pl/en/55g5gx (site in English)

Here’s the text from slides (all 10 pics are slides from instagram, with light background and black text on them): 1. What's happening in Poland and why it's worse than you think 2. Access to abortion It has been one year since Poland's Constitutional Tribunal ruled that pregnancies can be terminated only in cases of rape or incest, or if the life of the woman is endangered. The ruling excludes fetal defects – which account for the vest majority of terminations in the country. The death of the 30-year-old Izabela, who died of septic shock after doctors waited for her unborn baby’s heart to stop beating, is the first publicly known person to die as a direct result of the ruling. Protests are being held al around Poland and abroad (source: Politico, Reuters) 3. Migration and asylum The European Court of Human Rights ruled that Poland had unlawfully refused entry to asylum seekers at the Poland-Belarus border. In March 2020, Poland closed it’s border with Belarus, effectively making it impossible for people to access Polish territory to seek asylum. Since then many people, including children, have camped out on a stretch od land located between the Polish and Belarusian border control. They cannot return to Belarus nor can they enter Poland. As of Nov. 2, an Iraqi man is the tenth refugee to have died on the Belarus-Polish boarder since the summer (source: Human Rights Watch, Info Migrants, Gazeta Wyborcza) 4. Sexual orientation and gender identity The government ramped up its attacks on women’s and LGBT rights, part of the government’s increasing hostile rhetoric against what it refers to as “gender ideology”. During his election campaign, President Duda frequently made homophobic statements. He stated that LGBT rights were an “ideology” more dangerous than communism and signed a “Family Charter” pledging to “defend children from LGBT ideology”. Authorities in one-third of Poland’s cities have identified their localities as “LGBT Ideology Free Zones” (source: Human Rights Watch) 5. Freedom of media, pluralism The populist, governing “Law and Justice” party effectively took over TVP (public TV broadcaster) and public radio shortly after winning the 2015 parliamentary and presidential elections. Polish government and ruling party continue to use “public” media as a tool for spreading their own propaganda, anti-LGBT agenda, and using it as a tool to win elections. Over the last year the government strengthened control over the press and continued its smear attacks on media outlets and journalists critical of the government and ruling party (source: Human Rights Watch). 6. Women’s and children’s rights In July, the Minister of Justice declared that Poland would withdraw from the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence, claiming the Convention is “harmful”, as it requires educators to teach children about gender. Earlier in the year, service providers reported that calls from domestic violence victims increased dramatically during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown but that the government did not take measures to support prevention or ensure availability of services and appropriate police response (source: Human Rights Watch). 7. Sex education Sex education in Polish schools is almost nonexistent. Equivalent classes are often led by catechist or biology teachers. Lessons and topics are often outdated and extremely conservative. A controversial bill, “Stop Pedophilia”, which would criminalize activities, educators and organizations providing sexuality education to children or information on sexual and reproductive health and rights was debated in parliament in April 2020 and subsequently sent to a committee for “further work”. The legislation aims to send sex educators to prison for up to five years (source: Human Rights Watch). 8. Independence of the judiciary The Polish constitutional crisis began in 2015, just after Poland’s governing party PiS won the elections. They cancelled the earlier appointment of five Constitutional Tribunal judges and packed

the Tribunal with new judges (affiliated with a ruling party). In 2017 there was a political takeover of the National Council of the Judiciary, a constitutional body responsible for protecting the independence judges. The government continues its attacks on members of the judiciary. Judges and prosecutors are subject to arbitrary disciplinary proceedings for standing up for the rule of law and speaking up against problematic judicial reforms – an interference with their judicial independence (source: Human Rights Watch, Marcin Matczak, The Foundation for Law, Justice and Society Foreign Policy, dw.com, NPR). 9. Birth control Poland has been ranked the lowest European country in terms of access to contraception and other family planning resources in a report by the European Parliamentary Forum on Population and Development (EPF). Only two types of birth control pills are funded by public health care system. Doctors can even refuse to prescribe one if it goes “against” their personal beliefs (source: Tygodnik Polityka, The European Parliamentary Forum for Sexual and Reproductive Rights). 10. How can you help - collect signatures for legalna.aborcja (legal abortion) project. Everyone can collect signatures, but only people with Polish citizenship can sign it.

- PROTEST! There will be protests happening all around Poland and abroad on Saturday, Nov 6 and Sunday, Nov 7 – check out what’s happening near you

- support these organizations and initiatives: Aborcyjny Dream Team, Aborcja Bez Granic, Women Help Women, Human Rights Watch

- donate to Aborcyjny Dream Team: https://zrzutka.pl/55g5gx (site in Polish) or https://zrzutka.pl/en/55g5gx (site in English)

[engelkeijsers]

Hey, I don’t know how many of you know this already, but LGBT+ rights have been violated in Poland for years now. Last year in July there was a pride parade in BIałystok, where people got beaten up for just participating and threatened with violence, and the gay flag was burned. During that time, there was also an incident, where a couple brought dangerous explosives to the pride march with plans to stop it and likely hurt or kill the people attending. They were only charged with attempted assault and were sentenced to 12 months in jail each, since under the Polish Constitution there's no such thing as a hate-crime on LGBTQ+ people. Later on the same year (2019), 1/3 of the whole country has declared itself an anti-LGBT zone/LGBT free zone. For months now, the rightist media and the main political party PIS (Prawo i Sprawiedliwość, which is Law and Justice in English) constantly call us an ideology and say how we want to destroy the Polish tradition and demoralize the children with our “deviations”, all that on national television and public appereances. At some point in the year, there was an installation of a giant rainbow in Warsaw. It was set on fire by homophobes, then it got rebuilt and set on fire again. Not long before this year’s election (which hapened in June) president Andrzej Duda, a member of PIS, introduced to the people a document called Karta Rodziny (more info about that here and here), signed it and announced it would be the end of the “LGBT ideology propaganda”. Also, this year a popular polish rigthtist anti-abortion and anti-lgbt activitst Kaja Godek has made a statement on public television, that "Gay people want to adopt children, because they want to molest and rape them”. For this statement she got sued by a group of gay people, who were (obviously) hurt by her words. She was deemed innocent, because the people that sued her couldn't prove they were gay and therefore couldn't prove they were personally hurt by her words. This incident alone proves that not only the public, the media and the government are against us, but also the "independent" courts. In this year’s election (mentioned above), Andrzej Duda was re-elected. His beliefs, as you could probably already tell, are extremely homophobic, but he’s not the only one in our government. Other polish politicians have said very hurtful things about the LGBT+ community; for example, Polish deputy Czarnek has said that LGBT has the same roots as Hitler’s national socialism. In some of Polish cities, mostly the big and popular ones, homophobic and and pro-life trucks are driving around, proclaiming that LGBT+ people are pedophiles and want to sexualize kids in schools (because we wanted sexual education). Poland is considered the most homophobic country in the EU.

Now, after all of this information you’re probably wondering where I’m going with all this, it didn’t happen recently after all. And you’re right, the last thing mentioned above was two months ago (which isn’t long, but isn’t ‘recently’ either). But this was just an introduction to what’s happening right now, at this moment.

Recently, Margot (Małgorzata Szutowicz, an LGBT activist; she/her pronouns) from StopBzdurom (eng: StopTheNonsense) organization was charged for vandalizing a car (which belonged to a Polish anti-LGBT organization) and for hanging rainbow flags on monuments as a form of protest against the blatant homophobia. She was arrested a few times and charged also for “violation of religious feelings”. A few days ago, she was put into 2 month pre-trial detention. Three days ago, Margot walked to the cops to be volountarily arrested but they didn’t take her. Instead, two hours later they made a scene and took her using force, without a warning. When the rest of the protestors surrounded the scene and started blocking the police cars, cops started using violence and arresting random people. Polish left wing deputees were with the protesters, covering them from the police with their own bodies and were getting law attorneys for the arrested protesters. The law attorneys however weren’t let to talk to those people until 1:30am. In Polish television, the journalists while talking about recent events were continously misgendering Margot by using her deadname and wrong pronouns.

The best way you can help right now is by educating yourself, your friends, family and mutuals on what’s happening in Poland right now, signing petitions (links below) and just checking on your polish LGBT mutuals and friends, they really need your love and support.

LINKS TO PETITIONS:

Abolish current anti-LGBT laws and protect LGBT people in Poland, call the EU to intervene

Ban acces to all EU funding programs to businesses operating in polish LGBT-free zones

We're under attack in Poland

EU: Stand with Poland’s LGBT communities

hold polish president andrzej duda accountable for hate speech against lgbt+ community

PETITION TO THE EUROPEAN COMISSION

PETITION TO MAKE SAFE ABORTION LEGAL IN POLAND

Also, if you want to donate, do not donate to change org. IF YOU WANT TO DONATE, DO IT HERE:

miłość nie wyklucza

stop bzdurom - fund for lawyers, more wild actions, and stickers

darowizna lambda warszawa

Please reblog and spread the news, so more people can know about this!!

[polish-lgbt-zone]

President Duda's response to the international criticism and the things he said to his supporters translated to English. The fact that he put MeToo in his tweets out of nowhere is so pathetic. Did he think people would go "oh, he supports MeToo, he's fine?"

[newstfionline]

Thursday, March 25, 2021

Poll: Learning setbacks a top concern for parents (AP) Parents across the U.S. are conflicted about reopening schools. Most are at least somewhat worried that a return to the classroom will lead to more coronavirus cases, but there’s an even deeper fear that their children are falling behind in school while at home. Sixty-nine percent of parents are at least somewhat concerned that their children will face setbacks in school because of the coronavirus pandemic, including 42% who say they’re very or extremely worried about it, according to a new poll from The University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Nearly as many, 64%, say they are at least somewhat concerned that in-person instruction will lead to more people being infected, but it’s only 33% who say they are very or extremely worried about the risk. That tension reflects the fears of a nation on the cusp of a widespread return to classroom teaching. More than a year after the pandemic started, more schools are now opening their doors to students or plan to do so in coming weeks.

Home school (US Census Bureau/Numlock) Since 2012, the rate of homeschooling in the United States has been pretty steady at about 3.3 percent. Then the pandemic hit, and according to the U.S. Census during the period late April to early May 2020, roughly 5.4 percent of households with children reported homeschooling. To be clear this isn’t doing school at home—they adjusted for that—it’s yank-the-kids-out-of-the-district homeschooling. By fall, that number was 11.1 percent of households opting for true homeschooling rather than virtual learning through school.

Damage from virus: Utility bills overwhelm some households (AP) Millions of U.S. households are facing heavy past-due utility bills, which have escalated in the year since the pandemic forced Americans hunkered down at home to consume more power. And now, government moratoriums that for months had barred utilities from turning off the power of their delinquent customers are starting to expire in most states. As result, up to 37 million customers—representing nearly one-third of all households—will soon have to reckon with their overdue power bills at a time when many of them are struggling with lost jobs or income. A study done by Arcadia, which runs a service that helps households lower utility bills, found that the average past-due amount by those in its network was roughly $850.

Is bad news the only kind? (NYT) Bruce Sacerdote, an economics professor at Dartmouth College, noticed something last year about the Covid-19 television coverage that he was watching on CNN and PBS. It almost always seemed negative, regardless of what was he seeing in the data or hearing from scientists he knew. When Covid cases were rising in the U.S., the news coverage emphasized the increase. When cases were falling, the coverage instead focused on those places where cases were rising. And when vaccine research began showing positive results, the coverage downplayed it, as far as Sacerdote could tell. But he was not sure whether his perception was correct. To check, he began working with two other researchers, building a database of Covid coverage from every major network, CNN, Fox News, Politico, The New York Times and hundreds of other sources, in the U.S. and overseas.      The results showed that Sacerdote’s instinct had been right. The coverage by U.S. publications with a national audience has been much more negative than coverage by any other source that the researchers analyzed, including scientific journals, major international publications and regional U.S. media. “The most well-read U.S. media are outliers in terms of their negativity,” Molly Cook, a co-author of the study, told me. About 87 percent of Covid coverage in national U.S. media last year was negative. The share was 51 percent in international media, 53 percent in U.S. regional media and 64 percent in scientific journals. Sacerdote is careful to emphasize that he does not think journalists usually report falsehoods. The issue is which facts they emphasize. Still, the new study—which the National Bureau of Economic Research has published as a working paper, titled, “Why is all Covid-19 news bad news?”—calls for some self-reflection from those of us in the media. Sometimes our healthy skepticism can turn into reflexive cynicism, and we end up telling something less than the complete story.

As Europe’s Lockdowns Drag On, Police and Protesters Clash (NYT) In Bristol, an English college town where the pubs are usually packed with students, there were fiery clashes between the police and protesters. In Kassel, a German city known for its ambitious contemporary art festival, the police unleashed pepper spray and water cannons on anti-lockdown marchers. A year after European leaders ordered people into their homes to curb a deadly pandemic, thousands are pouring into streets and squares. Often, they are met by batons and shields, raising questions about the tactics and role of the police in societies where personal liberties have already given way to public health concerns. From Spain and Denmark to Austria and Romania, frustrated people are lashing out at the restrictions on their daily lives. With much of Europe facing a third wave of coronavirus infections that could keep these stifling lockdowns in place weeks or even months longer, analysts warn that tensions on the streets are likely to escalate. In Britain, where the rapid pace of vaccinations has raised hopes for a faster opening of the economy than the government is willing to countenance, frustration over recent police conduct has swelled into a national debate over the legitimacy of the police—one that carries distant echoes of the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States.

Subterranean playgrounds—and refuge (Atlas Obscura) Thought to be the world’s only city with an underground master plan, Helsinki began excavating tunnels through bedrock in the 1960s to house power lines, sewers and other utilities. City planners quickly realized that the space could also be home to retail, cultural, and sporting attractions—and that it could shelter the city’s population of 630,000 in the event of an invasion from its neighbor to the East, Russia. Today, nearly 200 miles of tunnels snake beneath Helsinki, providing a weatherproof subterranean playground. But hidden behind the bright lights are emergency shelters fitted with life-sustaining equipment: an air filtration system, an estimated two-week supply of food and water, and cots and other comforts. “It’s comfortable and safe,” says Eija Kivilaakso, Helsinki’s chief underground planner. “If it’s raining, you can drive into the city center to an underground car park and go straight into department stores from elevators. You can dress for comfort instead of in cold-weather clothes. If the weather is not comfortable, people choose the underground.”

Cars become home for Spain’s pandemic casualties (AP) When the social worker called to tell Javier Irure that he was being evicted, the 65-year-old Spaniard couldn’t fathom that he could end up homeless after five decades of manual labor. ��I grabbed some clothes, a few books and other things, wrapped them up in a bed sheet and told myself, ‘I have one more roof to put over my head: my car,’” Irure said from inside the old Renault Clio compact that has been his shelter for the past three months. Irure belongs to the multitude of economic victims of the coronavirus pandemic. He managed to avoid getting COVID-19, but the labor slowdown caused by restrictions on movement and social activities the Spanish government imposed to control the spread of the virus proved lethal to his financial stability, and he lost his apartment. The pandemic has been particularly hard on Spain’s economy due to its reliance on tourism and the service sector. The country’s left-wing government has maintained a furlough program to reduce the impact, but over a million jobs have been wiped out. Catholic aid organization Cáritas Española said earlier this month that around a half-million more people, or 26% of all its aid recipients, have reached out for help since the start of the pandemic. Like Javier, some are living in their cars.

Writer faces prison after calling Polish president ‘moron’ for confusion over U.S. electoral college (Washington Post) Polish writer Jakub Zulczyk says he is facing up to three years in prison after he called Poland’s president a “moron” for saying he did not understand the U.S. electoral college system. Writing on Facebook on Monday, Zulczyk said that a district prosecutor in Warsaw had filed an indictment, using an article in Poland’s penal code that prohibits insults against the head of state. The writer said he had not been contacted by the prosecutor and had found out about the indictment from a Polish news site. International rights groups have criticized Duda’s ruling Law and Justice party for clamping down on freedom of speech and an independent judiciary. Freedom House, a U.S.-based group, has called Poland’s laws related to insults “harsh” and noted that libel should be a criminal, rather than civil, offense.

Rohingya refugee camp fire (Reuters) A devastating fire that tore through a sprawling Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh killed 15 people and left tens of thousands homeless, the United Nations said Tuesday. More than 550 people were injured and 400 remain missing. The fire began Monday afternoon at Balukhali camp, one of several such settlements in Cox’s Bazar in southern Bangladesh, which is home to nearly 1 million Rohingyas who fled from neighboring Myanmar.

North Korea fires short-range missiles in challenge to Biden administration (Washington Post) North Korea fired off multiple short range missiles last weekend after denouncing Washington for going forward with joint military exercises with South Korea, according to people familiar with the situation. The missile tests, which have not previously been reported, represent North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s first direct challenge to President Biden, whose aides have not yet outlined their approach to the regime’s nuclear threat amid an ongoing review of U.S.-North Korea policy. For weeks, U.S. defense officials warned that intelligence indicated that North Korea might carry out missile tests. The regime elevated its complaints about U.S. military exercises last week when Kim’s sister warned that if the Biden administration “wants to sleep in peace for the coming four years, it had better refrain from causing a stink.” The tests put renewed pressure on the United States to develop a strategy to address a nuclear threat that has bedeviled successive Republican and Democratic administrations for decades.

South Koreans Are Furious Over Housing Scandal (NYT) The 10 people bought $8.8 million worth of land in an undeveloped area southwest of Seoul, registering it for farming and planting numerous trees. It’s a common trick used by shady real estate speculators in South Korea: Once the area is taken over for housing development, the developers must pay not only for the land, but the trees, too. A national outrage erupted this month when South Koreans learned that the 10 people were officials from the Korea Land and Housing Corporation (LH)—the government agency in charge of building new towns and housing—suspected of using privileged information to cash in on government housing development programs. The incident has thrown President Moon Jae-in’s government into crisis mode just weeks before key mayoral elections that are largely seen as a referendum on him and his party ahead of next year’s presidential race. Young South Koreans are saying they are fed up with corruption and the president’s failed policies on runaway housing prices. The LH scandal is now set to become a critical voter issue in Mr. Moon’s final year in office. President after president has promised to make housing more affordable in South Korea, but real-estate prices have kept soaring, undermining public trust.

Massive cargo ship turns sideways, blocks Egypt’s Suez Canal (AP) A cargo container ship that’s among the largest in the world has turned sideways and blocked all traffic in Egypt’s Suez Canal, officials said Wednesday, threatening to disrupt a global shipping system already strained by the coronavirus pandemic. The MV Ever Given, a Panama-flagged container ship that carries trade between Asia and Europe, became grounded Tuesday in the narrow, man-made waterway dividing continental Africa from the Sinai Peninsula. An Egyptian official blamed a strong wind in the area for the incident. Egyptian forecasters said high winds and a sandstorm plagued the area Tuesday, with winds gusting as much as 50 kph (31 mph). The Egyptian official said tugboats hoped to refloat the ship and that the operation would take at least two days. The Ever Given, built in 2018 with a length of nearly 400 meters (a quarter mile) and a width of 59 meters (193 feet), is among the largest cargo ships in the world. It can carry some 20,000 containers at a time. About 12% of world trade by volume passes through the canal connecting Europe and Asia.

Work affects bosses, workers differently (Bloomberg) A new survey of 30,000 workers in 31 countries by the popular gaming and social networking service Microsoft found that 61 percent of business leaders said that they were striving, while just 39 percent said they were surviving or struggling. That 61 percent living their best life is markedly out of step with the entire rest of society—23 percentage points higher than the average worker—where 54 percent said they are overworked, 39 percent described themselves as exhausted, and straight up 41 percent of people said they are considering just leaving their jobs, a level of burnout not seen before.

[aces-nrw]

International Call to Solidarity with the Polish LGBTQIA+ Community!

TW Queermisia Police Violence explicit Homomisia & Transmisia Conversation Therapy Hunger Strike Imprisionment

I would like to comply with the request that came from the gathering of the Ace Organizers International (further information at the end of this text). I hereby want to take on my responsibility and use my reach as an activist for queer rights, speaking from my position within the asexual community (and if even possible, „on behalf of the German acespec …“ after consultation with fellow activist and cross-regional organizer Lea) and, as a person with German-Polish citizenship, to show my solidarity and support for the fight for queer human rights in Poland.

I hope this message will find you well, dearest warriors, and you see this as a sign of hope for you are not alone in this. Your efforts, your actions are not in vain. You shall know that we wont ignore what has been done to you and your people. And what is still happening to this very day. Our thoughts, our hearts and our deepest hopes are with you!

–

The current situation in Poland has been described as quite critical for queer people. Poland is a very conservative country with a strong hold of anti-progressive, ultra Catholic influences, who aren’t just hate-mongering in their rhetoric only, but are also to blame for vile verbal and physical attacks on people „read/perceived as queer“ in public by anti-LGBTQIA+ organizations they have helped to build (f.ex.: so-called Saint Michael’s The Archangel Special Forces), according to reports.

The climate is dictated by right-wing nationalists, anti-LGBTQIA + hate speech and propaganda spread by politicians; queerness is vilified as „ideology“ (hence the hashtag #NieJestemIdeologia – ‚[I] am not an ideology‘ used on social media), seen as a tool for recurring communism, even as a new plague (Euronews) of leftist ethos or portrayed as the influence of foreign powers to be „fought against“. Blatant lies are making their rounds, such as that sex education in schools „would make children queer„, and not few believe and publicly call for queer people to undergo „conversation therapy„ (x). Meanwhile, the streets are patrolled by a truck that hatefully equates queerness, especially homosexuality, with child abuse (Washington Post, 08.08.).

Margot in particular, non-binary activist from the Kolektyw Stop Bzdurom (Stop Bullshit Collective), was at the focus of this very hatred (Mannschaft Magazin 09.08.), especially just after being recently release of the previous imprisonment, through explicit transimic coverage from the Polish Media (e.g. via @.radio_ZET und @.PolsatNewsPL). The collective drew attention to the situation for the Polish queer community particularly by flying rainbow flags on local statues and monuments. In the very first interview (VOGUE) after being taken into custody, which many LGBTQIAP + people see as illegitimate and politically motivated, and one hunger strike, Margot criticizes not only the right-wing, but also liberal media and politicians who are condemning the actions and methods of local Polish queer activists. While some of them are seemingly pro LGBTQIA + rights, those only support equal rights under the conditions of playing by respectability politics („ale tylko póki jesteśmy potulni, grzeczni icichutko czekamy, aż ktoś łaskawie uzna nas za ludzi. Klasyczne „Jesteśmy sojusznikami, ale…„ translation: „But only as long as we docile, politely and calmly wait for someone to graciously recognize us as human beings. Classic ‚We are allies, but … ‚“).

For the Polish mainstream the active, visible, loud and proud uprising of LGBTQIAP+ people is considered a hostile affront to the status quo, a war declaration against the „good and righteous people“ of some sort. This very notion of suppressing and de-legitimizing queer demonstrations stems from an ultra-catholic faithfulness in which humility must be upheld as a virtue and any rebellion to be denounced as abstruse blasphemy.

The media often references the oh-so-democratic Poland and its threatened order by rioting queer people, although we know that extreme right-wing, fascist powers have been gaining strength in Poland for a long time now (Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2013) and it’s undermining any positive progress and ultimately even its own constitutional legality (Deutsche Welle and TAZon the threat to the independence of Polish courts). It were the so-called “LGBT + free zones” mainly (Pinknews and Human Rights Watch about the violation of the constitution through such anti-queer smear campaigns), that have made many of us abroad truly aware of the inhuman and threatening situation for Polish queer people.

President Duda and his right-wing populist ruling party PiS regularly contribute to the fact that queer people in Poland experience an uncanny degree of dehumanization. These „representatives of the people” violate human rights (AP, 08.08. , taz, 17.04.20; BBC 15.04.20; Human Right Watch using the example of restricting and dismantling of abortion rights and bodily autonomy; TW cis – & endonormativity // rape). These systematic repressions, especially against activists for LGBTQIAP+ rights, have been reinforced with the help of police violence for years now (Margot: „Takie sytuacje zdarzają się od lat – jesteśmy spisywani bez powodu, policja nie reaguje na przemoc wobec nas, a chroni homofobiczne ciężarówki.„; Politico, 05.08.; Mannschaft Magazin 09.08).

You saw what had happened to human rights defender and activist Elżbieta Podleśna after her “Our Lady of Equality” artwork – the rainbow iconography of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa. She is now being defamed as an “enemy of the people” and is threatened with imprisonment (taz 30.06.20; Amnesty).

ILGA Europe has created an „Anti LGBTI Timeline“ with brief depiction of the most recent history of anti-queer attacks in English. I found it very helpful for a short overview for those of you interested.

The international community, especially at the political level, can no longer accept the abuse and oppression of queer people in Poland or even dare to counter it with weak, ineffective phrase as a mere wagging finger.

It needs more than that!

I would like to call for you all to stick up for the people in Poland who are affected by state repression, violence and hostility. Please act in the capacities manageable and possible for you; show your queer siblings that they are not left behind! These inexhaustible, brave struggles for emancipation are immensely important and beyond historical importance. Let these courageous people know that we are by their sides and they do not fight this battle alone.

The request for backup and awareness comes from Marta from the Polish asexuals‘ association Asfera (Instagram: @asfera_polish_asexuals, facebook: https://www.facebook.com/edukacja.aseksualna ; https://www.facebook.com/aseksualizm) to collectively highlight local campaigns and Polish organizations (don’t forget to tag them if you write/ tweet / post something) and to support them in their fight for queer human rights!

Kampania Przeciw Homofobii (KPH) (Campain Against Homophobia)

Twitter: @kph_official ; https://twitter.com/kph_official

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lgbt.kph/

Kolektyw Stop Bzdurom (Stop Bullshit Collective)

Twitter & Instagram: @stopbzdurom https://twitter.com/stopbzdurom

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stopbzdurom/

You can make donations for legal fees (available in German and English): https://www.firefund.net/stopbzdurom

Miłość Nie Wyklucza (Love does not exclude)

Twitter: @milosc_https://twitter.com/milosc_

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Miloscniewyklucza

#LGBTtoLudzie #MuremZaMargot #JestemLGBT #JestemLGBTQIA

Wordpress

[veryfangurl]

If anyone wonders what is going on in Poland, just watch this.

Andrzej Duda won the election, with a little advantage, but he won.

LGBT+ community, my community, is not safe in my country. 

We were not safe to begin with, but this man promised, that he will make our lives even worse. 

Please, spread the word, and consider donation for:

https://wspieraj.kph.org.pl/

http://transfuzja.org/en/artykuly/donate.htm

https://mnw.org.pl/en/

If you can’t donate, please sign the petition:

https://action.allout.org/en/a/poland/?utm_campaign=a-poland&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

If you have twitter, you can also write to our president Andrzej Duda or prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki. 

If you are living in Poland and you’re looking for help, here is the list of places you can find it, in many of them you don’t have to speak polish to get help. 

Lista miejsc, w których możesz uzyskać pomoc psychologiczną lub prawną:

https://kph.org.pl/  <- Mental health help and legal assistance for LGBT+ community (they provide help in many cities, but their main working area is in Warsaw)

http://transfuzja.org/pl/artykuly/pomagamy.htm  <- Mental health help and legal assitance for Trans community

Telefon zaufania/helpline for Trans woman in Poland from Fundacja Feminoteka +48 731 731 551 (unfortunately I don’t know if they speak english)

http://lambdawarszawa.org/lambdawarszawa/aktualnosci/telefon-zaufania/  <- Lambda Warszawa Helpline, for everyone in Poland, check their website out, they also have support groups for Ukriainians!

https://www.lambda.szczecin.pl/pomoc/  <- Lambda Szczecin, they have support groups for LGB and for T, also individual therapies, also for Ukrainians!

https://grupa-stonewall.pl/en/we-support/  <- Grupa Stonewall in Poznań, they only have help in polish, but they’ll help you to find help in your language!

This are ones I can think of now, if you know more, please add.

[argivebeauty]

— answer these questions then tag 20 blogs you’d like to know better!

tagged by:  @odysseusnostos tagging:  @artfulprecision @traggedia @queenofkategat @vindictiveolympianqueen @reignofolympus & double tagging @philtatoshetairos again

nicknames:  duda

zodiac: i don’t believe in astrology but taurus

height: 1.78m

time:  11:52 am

favorite band / artist:  constantly changing but currently  etta james. i listen to all kinds of stuff tho. follow my last.fm account if you have one and i’ll follow back

song stuck in my head:  reggaeton lento by cnco  

last movie i saw: the edge of democracy by petra costa

last thing i googled:  the english title to the movie above lmao

other blogs: none

do i get asks: yes

why did i choose this username: it was the first that came to mind tbh

following:  340 but a lot of inactive accounts (this blog is old af)

average amount of sleep: it depends? i try to get my daily 8 hours but it’s not always possible lmao

what i’m wearing: overalls & all star tennis shoes

dream job: senator but like in a country where the law actually works

dream trip:  havana, cuba

favorite food:  anything unhealthy tbh lmao

play any instruments: nope

eye color: brown.

hair color:  as above

languages you speak:  portuguese, english, a bit of spanish and i studied french for a while but then after i stopped i forgot pretty much everything 

most iconic song:  there are frankly so many but since i’ve been in a political mood i’d pick latinoamerica by calle 13 this time bc i feel those lyrics DEEPLY

random fact:  i have a selfie kissing the cheek of the best president my country has ever had aka lula and it’s my favorite picture in the world

describe yourself as aesthetic things: coffee. printed newspapers. more coffee. red lipstick. large earrings. coffee ad infinitum.

[brehaaorgana]

Polish Social Media Propaganda Campaign: A Masterpost about Poland’s Law Banning the phrase “Polish Death Camps,” and Discussions of Polish Complicity in the Holocaust

The above are two different posts on the matter, but I’m making this my own post for the sake of being able to more easily edit/update this.

This is a part of Poland’s massive push to erase their own complicity in the Holocaust, and in post-Holocaust antisemitic violence. It is part of Poland’s rising antisemitism. It’s not just American youtube, however. It’s also Israeli youtube. So essentially, Poland is targeting the two countries in the world which have the largest Jewish populations today with this propaganda campaign. As of this morning [Tuesday, Feb. 13 2018] I have also seen tumblr users confirm having seen this advertisement campaign in the United Kingdom. 

There are multiple advertisements doing this.

Please consider reporting or flagging these ads. 

A Timeline Leading to Poland’s Propaganda Campaign:

12 January 2017: “The Polish Republic of Untruth,” this article addresses an interview where Anna Zalewska, Poland’s minister of education, denies that Polish Jews were murdered by Polish people in the town of Jedwabne, calling the fact that Poles burned Jewish people alive an “opinion.” Thanks to @aenya for linking me this article. 

November 2017: 60,000 far-right Polish nationalists march on Poland’s independence day, chanting “Pure Poland! White Poland!” Demonstrators were highly antisemitic, one claimed he was marching against “Jewry.” Despite this, or perhaps because of it, the Polish government seemed to praise the event: “It was a beautiful sight,” the interior minister, Mariusz Błaszczak, said. “We are proud that so many Poles have decided to take part in a celebration connected to the Independence Day holiday.”

9 December 2017: Poland desecrates Jewish cemetery; digs up graves and dumps human remains in a pile in order to make way for a parking lot.  

27 January 2018, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Poland’s senate passes on a bill proposing a ban on phrases like “Polish death camps,” - and proposes jail time for the use of such language.  The text [in English] is as follows: “Whoever publicly and contrary to the facts attributes to the Polish Nation or to the Polish State responsibility or co-responsibility for the Nazi crimes committed by the German Third Reich… or for any other offenses constituting crimes against peace, humanity or war crimes, or otherwise grossly diminishes the responsibility of the actual perpetrators of these crimes, shall be liable to a fine or deprivation of liberty for up to three years.” Discussion of ANY Polish complicity in the Holocaust is therefore also part of the proposed ban. Punishment can be jail time, fine, or “restriction of liberty.” Supporters of Polish President Andrzej Duda urge him to sign the bill regardless of strong objections from both the United States, Israel, and the academic community/Holocaust scholars. The measure passed through Parliament on the eve of Holocaust Remembrance Day, Jan 27th 2018. This causes Israel to postpone diplomatic meetings with Polish representatives, and both Israel and the USA voice objections to the measure.

2 February 2018: ISRAEL’S EMBASSY IN POLAND RECEIVES WAVE OF ANTISEMITIC MESSAGES AFTER HOLOCAUST BILL, The Polish President signs said bill into law, provoking another objection from Israel, and U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson releases a critical statement on the law.

10 February 2018, (as of this last Shabbat), Jewish Tumblr users begin to post warnings about Americans seeing these Pro-revisionism Polish videos on youtube. Others confirm Israelis have been inundated with these videos as well. Although I don’t know if it began earlier, I have noticed that people started first seeing these ads introduced on the Jewish weekly holy day/day of rest, and I do wonder if slipping them in when many Jewish people wouldn’t have noticed was intentional, which feels especially sinister.

12th February 2018, Jerusalem Post asks: WHY IS THE POLISH GOVERNMENT TARGETING ISRAELI WEB USERS? Simultaneously to this issue, News outlets begin to report: Poland to vote on law limiting kosher slaughter prompting Jewish backlash. This will attempt to re-ban Kosher and Halal slaughter, with a punishment of jail time, effectively criminalizing Jewish and Muslim communities for existing. 

Why This Law is so Deeply Troubling:

Please read this letter published (and then translated into English) by Polish teachers, [2 February 2018]. 

A brief selection does not do this letter justice, but here is some of it:

It was the Polish state – the Second Republic – that, in 1938, organized a camp in Zbąszyń where thousands of its Jewish citizens expelled from Nazi Germany, who had been instantly deprived of their citizenship by the Polish parliament, were imprisoned. It was the Polish state, represented by the Minister of Education that in 1937 sanctioned the “ghetto benches”, thus dividing the students in university halls on the very basis soon to be used to section people off behind the walls of the Nazi ghettos.

During the war, the Polish state – i.e., the government in London – was for over two years unable to condemn crimes against the Jews, neither on the radio, nor in the clandestine press. Even as the government did so, as late as in June 1942, it still refrained from publishing an open and resolute appeal to Poles that would call upon them to impede the extermination. It did not react accordingly despite mass deportations to death camps and despite the pleas of Shmuel Zygielbojm and Ignacy Schwarzbart, members of the Polish National Council in exile. In March 1943, a few weeks prior to the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto, when two million Jews had already been murdered in the Polish lands, Schwarzbart appealed to the Council: “I feel aggrieved at the Ministry of Interior Affairs, I feel aggrieved for it still has not addressed, in the name of this community of fate […], the Polish society so that – in this horrendous disaster, in this dreadful tragedy – they would support, as much as they can and by means they have at their disposal, morally and materially support the dying Polish Jews”.

Today, institutions of the Polish state prevent people from telling the truth about what happened during the war. Dwellers of many cities, towns, and villages do know about the murders and looting committed by Poles on their Jewish neighbors, and they want to express their sense of guilt. The national ideology which had inspired the crime is now used to enforce silence. Numerous politicians and journalists are telling us that there was an innocent nation and single atrocities committed by individuals. The opposite is the case: there were individuals who behaved in virtuous or in reprehensible ways, and a “nation”: a concept that served as justification for the crime

More readings:

1-2 February 2018:  Amid Holocaust Bill Spat With Israel, Polish State Media Suggests: Why Not [call them] 'Jewish Death Camps'? [see also “Polish TV Host Suhhests Calling Nazi Death Camps ‘Jewish Camps” and “Polish TV riposte to Holocaust bill criticism: Auschwitz was ‘Jewish death camp’]. This is a state media response to criticism of the bill: “Author Rafal Aleksander Ziemkiewicz, during the TVP2  show TVP Info, mocked critics of the legislation during a discussion with show host Marcin Wolski, who is also the director of TVP2. “If we look at the percentage of involvement of countries that took part [in the Holocaust], Jews also were part of their own destruction,” Ziemkiewicz said. Wolski responded: “Using this terminology, linguistically, we could say these were not German or Polish camps, but were Jewish camps. After all, who dealt with the crematoria?”

6 February 2018: an article which asks an important question – Poland wants to outlaw blaming Poles for Nazi atrocities. But what about the Jedwabne massacre? To cut to the chase, in an occupied town of Poland in 1941, the Polish residents rounded up the town’s Jewish population, and then willingly (and freely) slaughtered an estimated 400-1,400 of their Jewish neighbors [numbers are estimates as the site was not fully excavated, but rather exhumed in a controlled section], as German forces looked on. The Germans had even refused to let them use firearms, and so the gentile Polish residents of Jedwabne used farm tools as their method of execution.

Following the end of the Holocaust is another example people are worried is banned from discussion. In 1946, after the defeat of Nazi Germany, Polish gentiles in Kielce held a pogrom against Holocaust survivors returning home. They murdered 42 Jewish Holocaust survivors.

Reported Countries seeing these videos: 

Israel, The United States, U.K. [x], Switzerland [x], Germany [x], Denmark [x], France [x] on yotube and twitter. The algorithm seems to frequently target people who watch Jewish videos/content but this is showing up even if you are watching something unrelated or aren’t Jewish (gaming videos, ASMR, etc). 

[fictionfromafar]

Resilience by Bogdan Hrib

Resilience

By Bogdan Hrib

Translated by Marina Sofia

Corylus Books

Having enjoyed Sword by Bogdan Teodorescu at the end of last year, I was very keen to explore further crime fiction from Romania and thanks to Corylus Books, I have not had too long to wait.

It’s much too early to make generalisations based on two novels, but like Sword, there is also a political element to Resilience, one that is not too flattering to politicians. Perhaps I am sensing that Romanian writers have become somewhat jaded by the opportunists that have appeared in their political system.

This is Hrib’s first translation into English language and I read this book without any prior knowledge of the author’s writing. Midway through the book I came to realise that Resilience is part of a series however the story functions perfectly well as a standalone novel. The principal characters of the story are Stelian Munteanu and Tony Demetriade. It become evident while Corylus Books have chosen to start with Resilience as their first translation of Hrib as many of the issues explored within the book are very topical.

Resilience is set in 2019, the year in which Romania held the EU presidency; and the 30th anniversary of the Romanian Revolution which generated a large degree of international interest in a reflection of that time. Ana Coman is a young project manager at the Romanian Institute in the UK who is in Newcastle Upon Tyne to host an exhibition of images from the revolution.

When she is found dead beside the sea near South Shields, Munteanu - who is a former journalist, writer and amateur investigator - is approached by her father, Pavel Coman to investigate her death. He is a Romanian business baron, who is involved in various businesses in the naval sector. He does not hesitate to believe that the death of his daughter was not an accident. Coman is convinced that she has been murdered. Reluctantly Munteanu agrees - his wife Sofia lives in London and this allows him the opportunity to spend some time with her. Much to his distaste though, in England, he is paired with Coman’s right hand man, Jack King.

When a related death occurs back in Romania, Munteanu’s friend, the experienced policeman Tony Demetriade and his young assistant Anabella Paduraru are brought in to investigate. The British police then get involved when several female acquaintances of the original victim are targeted in London by an unknown gunman. The Romanian and British investigators must collaborate and share their information or risk the crimes and connections being unsolved. The story features a range of dubious characters including a member of the Romanian secret service, a Moldovan social media manipulator and an opportunist politician from a neighbouring country.

The story gradually evolves from a crime fiction novel to a geographical thriller which has so much relevance to the current age. The European Union has been impacted by the ill conceived departure of the United Kingdom and there are now different competing visions for its future. Romania is somewhat in the orbit of the Visegrád 4 which comprises Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. These countries do not share the post-World War Two vision of the EU espoused by mainstream decision-makers in western Europe, in countries like Germany, France and Italy. Rather their vision for Europe is one where the nation state is strong and independent with a restrictive immigration policy particularly towards migrants from Africa and the Middle East. Indeed since this novel was written the governments in Viktor Orbán's Hungary and Andrzej Duda's Poland have made front-page news over the last few months for thumbing their nose at EU laws and lectures while Poland and now Romania have recently been chastised by Brussels over attempts to compromise the independence of their judiciary. When even press freedoms are being curtailed by so called mainstream politicians in Poland, it is clear that more extreme views must be held by fringe parties. Hrib explores this within Resilience.

Combined to this wider regional context is the historic anniversary of the Romania revolution, while the book makes regular references to significant dates such as 10th August which marks the date of previous political protests in 2018 as well as nationalist sentiments to a reunification of Romania with the neighbouring former Soviet Republic of Moldova. With part of the story taking place in the Moldovan capital Chișinău as well as the nearby Romania city of Iași - where an imposing statue of Stephen the Great is intended to face off Turkish invaders (surely to the approval of politicians like Viktor Orbán!). Very topically, can the onset of the fake news phenomenon and growing influence of conspiracy theorists be engineered to lead to mass political unrest? How resilience is the system, can the simultaneity factor be breached? Critical stresses of surveillance and corruption feature prominently and clearly relate to some of Romania's recent troubled history.

While most British crime fiction readers are unlikely to be acquainted with the politics of Eastern Europe, Resilience successfully taps into the political uncertainty and dubious narratives of the modern age. To use one example, remarkably a scene in the story sees a group of manipulated protesters appear at a television channel, something that occurred just last week in the UK!

British readers will feel a familiarity with the language used in Resilience. Superbly translated by Marina Sofia who has lived half her life in the UK, the vocabulary used is straightforward and uncluttered. There are numerous references to locations in both London and the North East of England which will resonate with many UK readers as well.

The most challenging aspect of the story is the changing perspectives and locations. The narrator follows many characters, often changing perspectives, so you always have to be careful to figure out who the story is centered on at some point. Several pages will relate to a particular character in one location, before a heading is provided for another location or date. More than once I had to reread a paragraph to figure out which character was being featured at a particular time. The realisation can come quite quickly but at times the vague beginning does demand attention. This is perhaps my weakness as I'm not always very attentative to headers. As the action is fragmented a degree of patience and attention are required when reading Resilience, yet these are rewarded. While the wider issues I've mentioned are explored through the story, there are satisfying conclusions to the investigative elements of the story. My first introduction to the writing of Bogdan Hrib was a revelation. I enjoyed the thriller aspects to the story and also feel there is a lot of modern day context to the stories he writes.

Bogdan Hrib was born in Bucharest, Romania in 1966. A former journalist, civil engineer by training and now professor at a Bucharest university, Hrib is the co-founder of Tritonic Books (1993). He has been instrumental in bringing foreign crime writers to a Romanian audience, but also introducing Romanian crime writers to the English-speaking world. He was the vice-president of the Romanian Crime Writers Club (2010-2012), and the director/organizer of the International Mystery & Thriller Festival in Râșnov (2011-2015), as well as the PR coordinator of the History Film Festival also in Râșnov. He is the author of the crime fiction series featuring Stelian Munteanu, a book-editor with a sideline doing international police work. Two of the previous books in the series have been translated into English language: Kill The General and The Greek Connection.

Marina Sofia was born in Romania but has lived more than half of her life in the UK. She was a reviewer for Crime Fiction Lover for more than seven years and has worked for Asymptote Literary Journal. Her previous translation for Corylus Books was Sword by Bogdan Teodorescu.

Many thanks to Ewa Sherman for inclusion on the book tour for Resilience and to Corylus Books for an advance copy of this book. Please see the other reviews of Resilience on the book tour as shown below.

Great to meet Corylus Books cofounder Jacky Collins today where we discussed this book: